In what’s been a stunning turn of events, Penn State fired James Franklin on Sunday morning after his team followed up a home loss to Oregon with a shocking defeat at UCLA and then lost to another massive underdog, Northwestern. Franklin’s firing and Penn State eating about $45 million in his buyout means AD Pat Kraft probably has a plan for what the school will do in its coaching search.
There are two obvious front-runners for this vacancy. Both are Big Ten coaches with strong local ties.
While Penn State was losing to Northwestern, Curt Cignetti’s Indiana team was pulling off college football’s other massive news as the Hoosiers won at Oregon. The 64-year-old Pittsburgh native has done remarkable work at IU. He brought a bunch of good players with him from James Madison, assembled an excellent staff and totally changed the mindset in Bloomington. He talked big, and won bigger. He led Indiana to the College Football Playoff in Year 1 and has a 17-2 record midway through his second season. If there’s a splash hire for Penn State, it’d be Cignetti.
The way his team handled Oregon, with six sacks of a quarterback who had been taken down only once previously this season, as well as putting up 30 points at Autzen, speaks volumes for how Cignetti has elevated this program. That win at Oregon is bigger than any game Penn State has won in years. Cignetti would owe Indiana $13 million if he left before Dec. 1 and $10 million after that.
The other front-runner is Kraft’s pal Matt Rhule, the Nebraska head coach. They worked together when Kraft was the AD at Temple and Rhule was the Owls head coach.
“Matt loves Pat and Pat loves Matt,” an industry source told The Athletic Sunday.
The 50-year-old led the Owls to consecutive 10-win seasons in 2015 and 2016, including a 27-10 win over Penn State in 2015. Rhule is a former Nittany Lions linebacker and also did outstanding work at Baylor in what was a very tough situation. He has a bunch of deep ties in Happy Valley.
Rhule is in his third season in Lincoln, and the Huskers have gotten better each year, going from 5-7 to 7-6 to 5-1 this year. It’s very doubtful he could say no to his alma mater or his old boss. Rhule would owe Nebraska $5 million if he left.
If Penn State can’t land one of those two, the search feels like it gets a lot leaner. We heard Sunday morning that Kraft might consider Duke’s Manny Diaz. He really impressed folks inside the Penn State program in his two years (2022-23) as Franklin’s defensive coordinator. Diaz did some good things in three seasons as Miami’s head coach, going 21-15 with one Top 25 season. His tenure at Duke so far has been more impressive, with the Blue Devils going 13-6 overall and 8-3 in ACC play.
Vanderbilt’s Clark Lea, who has done really good work at his alma mater, is another potential option. The 43-year-old, who has worked at several other strong academic schools, has Vandy at 5-1 this season after leading the Commodores to a bowl game last year.
Iowa State’s Matt Campbell, 45, is also well regarded. He led ISU to its best season in school history in 2020 when the Cyclones finished No. 9 in the nation. The program took a dip but has bounced back. Iowa State is 5-2 this season despite its secondary getting ravaged by injury. He’s had a ton of success at a program that has struggled mightily over the years.
Iowa State has not won a conference championship since 1912, but it has twice played for the Big 12 title under Campbell. We’ve heard that the NFL is a more likely destination if Campbell leaves Ames, but the Penn State job is a huge one.
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